The meeting concluded not too long later, and the trio waved goodbye to me, the sounds of my shoes clomping on the tile and the bells on Hieu's hat filling the silence. I stopped before I exited.
*Right. There's another reason why I'm here. How could I forget?*
"Pardon, but what's the time?"
Hikaru twirled his fingers, and a clock made of rays from the sun appeared with a frenzied second hand spinning around.
"I need to fix this thing…" he mused. "It's 12:28 PM. Do you have anywhere to be?"
My eyes widened. I only had two minutes to find the kitchen in a palace I had never entered in my life. I was shameless enough to beg a king for help by then.
"Yes, Your Majesty. Where might the castle's dining hall be?"
Hikaru looked perplexed. "For what reason?"
"The princess invited me to lunch there at 12:30."
He smirked. "I see. I'll send you down there myself since time is important."
*Hey, I didn't even have to get on my knees.*
I smiled at the gesture. "That would be excellent. Thank you, Your Majesty."
He gave me another mysterious laugh. What was so amusing? I (hopefully) wasn't clad in a "kick me" sign or endowed with a colorful mohawk.
"Of course. Have a wonderful lunch, dear!" He sounded like Mr. Wen right then.
And that was how I was zapped to the doors of the dining hall, sent by a giggly king to have lunch with a princess. It wasn't half bad.
***
When I again used the tile to check my hair before walking in, I was surprised to find it untangled and devoid of static electricity, probably courtesy of Hikaru.
*I must have looked like a wreck back there…*
The clock above the ornate doors read 12:31 PM, so I strolled in nonchalantly. If I acted like I wasn't late (or about to be), nobody would notice.
"So you decided to show up, eh?" Koharu asked with a grin and a raised eyebrow. She was dressed elegantly in a white coat and slacks. A fabric tied around her neck was like some cross between a choker and a tie, accentuating her skin nicely.
"Yes. Send my regards to your father for getting me here. I would have been lost otherwise."
"He can be a talker, can't he? That meeting must have taken forever." Walking over to a plant, she stroked its leaves delicately.
I nodded. "His advisors were much less sociable, though."
"Totally. But they're kind once you get to know them." She moved to sit at the end of the table and drew up the closest chair to her on the left side. "Why don't you come sit down?"
Her bright smile—dare I called it endearing—was on display again. I tried to ignore it with the hope no red would show on my face and nodded again, sitting on the woven cushion.
"The food will be out in a few minutes, by the way. I didn't feel like preparing it myself today. Had to deal with all the merchants from a nearby kingdom storming Mirai and scamming people. You know, typical castle matters as I'm sure you'll find."
The princess spoke fluidly as if she was completely unbothered by conversing with someone she had barely even met. I simply shook my head in agreement. I was usually comfortable with people as well (I was well-known for my remarks), but I found something to be either eerie or imposing about Koharu's demeanor. That kept me quieter than I normally would have been.
After rambling, she tapped me on the arm. "Relax a bit!" She beamed to comfort me as that same tooth that always did poked out. "It's not an interview. And by the way, white is far more flattering on you than the black robes Dad makes the staff wear."
*Why are you being so nice to me?*
My cheeks went a tad scarlet at the compliment. "Thank you. The Moon Castle looks like a burial in progress when you have to work there. Wait…" I was so flustered that I missed a key descriptor. "I'm wearing white?"
She chuckled, not nearly as giddy as the other night but still happier than most people were around me. "Yes, you are." She grabbed my sleeve, sliding the fabric between her thumb and index finger as she examined it. "Father probably switched your robes when he sent you down here. I have nothing against black. It's my favorite color, but Dad likes to take the minimalist route to just plain lazy with it. It's not like this castle isn't a pain to look at sometimes."
"Pfft. I think my retinas bled out the moment I walked in if I'm completely honest."
Koharu laughed. "You think that's bad? I *live* here."
"When are you getting glasses?"
As she snorted, the clanging of metalware was audible, and a woman emerged from a door behind Koharu with a trolley. She set two covered metal platters in front of us, placing them upon knitted cloths. Upon bamboo mats, from which I had to move my hands, she then served porcelain plates. Finally, she laid down the silverware and put two beverages on their respective coasters.
"Lunch is served!" she declared with a smile as she removed the tops from the platters. She whisked them away and placed them back on her cart.
There was a pile of paninis sliced in half, oozing a variety of exquisite cheeses. Each was colored with the greens and reds of butterhead lettuce and sun-dried tomatoes, and the chicken, which laid perfectly cut beneath, glimmered from the sauce with which it was cooked. The second tray held many types of fruit. The outer ring was comprised of triangles of juicy watermelon—the essence of sunshine and summer. A concentric ring held a mixture of colorful grapes that were plump like marbles, and the ring inside that held cubed melons and cantaloupe. A couple of two-pronged forks poked out of this layer. Finally, the center was a cluster of pineapple prisms—yellow like the castle—which surrounded the lush leaves that were cut from the top and used as a centerpiece.
"Ophelia, you're practically drooling. Seems like I have good taste?"
I wiped the spit off my mouth fervently, and I bumped her arm, immediately retracting mine from nervousness. "I wasn't drooling, but damn, this looks good. I guess you do."
Koharu looked amused. She turned to the cook. "Thank you very much for getting this all together. Have a lovely day with your family."
She appeared shocked. "You mean to say I'm dismissed?"
"Of course! Now go on if you'd like."
The lady bowed to Koharu with sparkly eyes and scampered off while pushing the trolley with a skip in her step. The doors slammed behind her, leaving us in our own little world of chatter and food aplenty.
"You're in an exceptionally good mood today…?" I asked while grabbing a panini. I grasped the toothpick and struggled with removing the wood from the sourdough bread.
"Indeed. I've been waiting for you to arrive. I've been interested in talking to you."
I took a bite and wiped my lips. Koharu rested one hand under her chin as she reached for a fork to take a bite of melon. She let the juice glisten over her pink lips.
"What could possibly be interesting about me? I'm merely another advisor."
Koharu reached for the pineapple. "There hasn't been an inauguration in a long time. Most of the advisors are either old or boring. They've lost their youth." She chewed and continued after I gave her no response. "I always enjoy change—new things. That's not to say I'll throw anything away if it's too old,"—she inspected another ripe piece of fruit—"but the same few faces are rather dull to see for days on end."
Sipping from her cup, she gulped several times.
"Don't tell me you're getting all philosophical drunk on me. Yesterday was enough with your talking."
*You're acting almost the same…*
She laughed. "I'm entirely sober. This is green tea. I'm a sucker for conversation at any rate." After showing it to me, she peered over the edge of the cup. "I don't recall you being so mouthy as a child, though. That's kinda my thing. Granted, I'm younger than you, but my point still stands. Anyway, would you rather I act all clingy and bold like when I'm actually drunk then?"
"No preference on that matter. I'm not sure which I'd be scared of more."
*Just don't make me all skittish with the compliments… It's a weird (but not awful) feeling…*
I continued, "I didn't smart off as much as a child because I always had my dad hovering over me, and he's one of the few people I have enough respect for to not act like a jerk around all the time."
"That's hard to imagine. You're snarkier than Aaron, and I'd say that's a feat."
"Hey—"
"But that's certainly not bad. I find it to be a challenge to see how many ways I can push the buttons of people and how they'll react. Especially since that's also what I'm like."
*Is that supposed to be a good thing…?*
"I don't really know how I should react to a statement like that other than for you to bring it on… I guess?"
"See," she cheered as she stuck out her arm, "you already have a better attitude than the rest of the advisors. They would have had Father on me in a minute."
Koharu laughed in such a way that—if it were Leo perhaps—I would have been enraged. Instead, I felt like chuckling along with her, rather fond of the company. It didn't take long for me to enjoy being around her despite my initial reservations.
"I don't get why you don't befriend Aaron with all you're saying. I live across the border. The only part of me that's here is my consciousness."
Moving away, she whined, "I don't think you take hints too well."
"Pardon?" I almost choked on a piece of chicken.
*You've stated everything about yourself pretty directly.*
"I've been wanting to speak with you since you were a child." She finally bit into a panini after stalling with the appetizers. "I always had a liking towards a certain visitor with pretty features who was around my age and would come in with her father occasionally, you know. Call it catching up from those days if you'd like."
During the next phase of the praise barrage, I genuinely gagged on the poultry. Koharu's face grew alarmed, and she vaguely reminded me of Hikaru. I didn't cough for very long, but her expression refused to falter.
"Hey, are you okay?" she asked while reaching towards me. "I didn't mean to catch you off guard a moment ago."
"I'm fine now," I replied with a hoarse voice, practically inhaling tea.
"That's good." She smiled happily, relieved.
"Anyway, I can see why you called yourself verbose last night. You slide in compliments like they're nothing. I only have the audacity to do that with insults for the most part."
She took another bite. "Ah, yes. I don't actually do that often."
*Seriously?*
"You're pretty sassy as I said before," she added to not harp on her previous statement. "Imagine if I were as uptight as my brother. Your head would be on a stake by now if he got to make the decisions. You should hold your tongue around him."
"I'm well aware," I said as I reached for a slice of watermelon. The red juice streamed down my hands, and I quickly reached for the napkin encasing the cutlery. By then, the white cuffs of my outfit were stained. I grimaced at them.
Koharu grinned again. I accepted that her outgoing attitude was just a part of her personality. "You don't have to worry about that. It's cute."
I was about to spit the seeds out at her for that. "Koharu, this is a white shirt. No amount of washing it will fully remove the color."
"That's wonderful if you want a pink shirt, though."
"Arguable."
"I can always clean it for you before you leave."
I paused my eating for a second. "If you weren't magical, I'd have taken that as a red flag by now. I don't want to inconvenience you."
"It's no problem at all." She flicked a finger to take the watermelon away from me.
"Hey, I was—"
She raised the digit to make me levitate in the air, surrounding me in a veil of yellow light.
"It's as easy as one."
*Up.*
"Two."
*Up.*
"Three."
Summoning a pillow to cushion my fall, she dropped me from the air.
"Magicians are ready to give me a heart attack, I think."
Koharu laughed heartily in the background as she removed the pink from my cuffs.
"And isn't that thrilling?"